"War may sometimes be a necessary evil.
But no matter how necessary,
it is always an evil, never a good.
We will not learn how to live together
in peace by killing each other's children."
Jimmy Carter,
US diplomat & Democratic politician (1924 - )

• Monday I received a call from the plastic surgeon that three of the six places he removed last week were cancer.     He strongly suggested leaving the top up on the convertible from this point on, and investing in SPF 45 sunscreen, citing the fact that a fair-haired, freckled Irish gal doesn't need to be exposed to the sun;
  
• Tuesday was another doctor's appointment to tell me that they still don't know what's causing my problems, but I do have an elevated white count, some type of undeterminable bacterial infection, and an enzyme imbalance in my liver.     To top that off, they scheduled me for early the following morning at the hospital for even more tests;
  
• Wednesday morning -- I total my convertible in a freakish accident.     I guess the plastic surgeon got his wish . . . I'm transported to the hospital (the very hospital I was on my way to for testing) and am seen in the ER before being transferred to the diagnostic center for tests;
  
• Thursday, my doctor's office calls to say the ER results are back and I have several cracked ribs, a slight concussion and a bruised liver . . . so, just take it easy and rest; and
  
• Friday, my friend who wasn't given the final clearance to leave with his Seabee battalion this past Monday due to a blown ACL and accompanying surgery last year, received word yesterday afternoon that the only other member of the battalion with clearance and certification on the equipment that he is certified on *popped* out and is being sent back home, so my friend has to leave on 03/07, meet up with his batallion without benefit of any combat training, and ship directly out to Iraq with the rest of his batallion at that time.     He will be gone a minimum of nine months, perhaps longer.

"What difference does it make to the dead,
the orphans and the homeless,
whether the mad destruction is wrought
under the name of totalitarianism
or the holy name of liberty or democracy?"
Mahatma Gandhi,
"Non-Violence in Peace and War"
Indian ascetic & nationalist leader (1869 - 1948)

"If a problem has no solution,
it may not be a problem, but a fact -
not to be solved, but to be coped with over time."
Shimon Peres,
Israeli (Polish-born) politician (1923 - )